More than 1 million HIV infected persons registered in Russia

Russia has more than 1 million HIV infected people, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Olga Golodets told the Fifth Conference on HIV/AIDS in Eastern Europe on Wednesday.

Russia has more than 1 million HIV infected people, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Olga Golodets told the Fifth Conference on HIV/AIDS in Eastern Europe on Wednesday.

"In 2014, there were two million new HIV cases, more than 6,000 people are infected daily. In Russia, more than 1 million HIV infected persons have registered since 1987," she said.

Golodets noted that 93,000 new HIV cases had been registered last year, adding that 28 million people were tested for HIV in Russia. "Over the past year, 93,000 new cases have been identified," she said.

The Russian deputy prime minister added that the HIV/AIDS issue was one of the most important for Russia. According to the statistics provided by her, 34 million people have died of AIDS in the world since 1987.

Some 5 mln Russian drug users in HIV infection risk group

According to the head of the country’s Federal Drug Control Service, around 5 million drug users in Russia are at risk for HIV infection.

"Between 3 million and 5 million drug users are in the direct risk group for the intense transmission of HIV infection," Viktor Ivanov said at the conference.

Ivanov stressed that one of the major reasons for the HIV infection transmission is that drugs are injected. "This is confirmed by Russian data. In 2015, more than half - 54% - of the newly detected HIV positive persons were infected during the injection of drugs," he said.